The Region

California's smog check program will be a year old next week, and the state Air Resources Board has begun a four-month study to find out how effective the mandatory biennial inspection program has been. As part of the study, about 50 cars were stopped at random on Santa Anita Avenue in El Monte. Officials found that emission control systems had been tampered with in about 20% of the cars stopped, but with such a small sampling, they said, it was too early to draw conclusions. No citations were issued.